


The World Is On Fire

by Mix Stitch (Synph)



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Aftermath of a Case, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Friendship, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Injury, Injury Recovery, Post-Series, Wolfsbane Poisoning
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-11-26
Updated: 2015-11-26
Packaged: 2018-05-03 13:07:08
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,700
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5292008
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Synph/pseuds/Mix%20Stitch
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>In hindsight, it makes perfect sense that a rogue werewolf hunter would use different supernatural variations of wolfsbane in order to protect their house.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The World Is On Fire

**Author's Note:**

  * For [tristen84](https://archiveofourown.org/users/tristen84/gifts).



> Another commission for tristen84! 
> 
> This one flowed so smoothly, I'm just super proud of it. This one revolves around hurt/comfort and Stiles kind of realizing that Isaac has been through some horrible stuff in his life. (Because let's be honest, Stiles hasn't exactly shown that he gets what Isaac has gone through.)

In hindsight, it makes perfect sense that a rogue werewolf hunter would use different supernatural variations of wolfsbane in order to protect their house.

At first, the massive cabin seems clear. Well, as clear as a house ripped straight from Stiles' architectural nightmares can be. It's a maze of winding hallways that double back on themselves and doors that lead to nowhere.

For the first half hour, all Scott, Stiles, and Isaac do is catalogue the house and its rowan paneled walls for future reference. It's the home of a hunter, someone nothing like Allison or her father, but more like a supernatural version of Jeffrey Dahmer.

Stile counts no fewer than three stuffed werewolves mounted or positioned in various positions throughout the eerily lit hallways. He doesn't dare go any closer than it takes to snap a photo and send it to Deaton, but he swears that he can see the telltale pale purple glimmer of the same kind of wolfsbane rope used to keep Laura Hale's body hidden.

A shudder races its way down Stiles' spine. He remembers how frightening it had been to see a body go from wolf to human when they were younger, but then, Laura hale hadn't been stuffed and mounted for someone's sick entertainment. Whatever is going to happen when someone (most likely Deaton or Braeden) undoes the rope, is something that Stiles doesn't want to see in person.

Stiles continues taking photographs as he follows behind Scott and Isaac. He's letting them take point for several reasons and so far, no one's forgotten him yet. Stiles glance around as they head down another narrow hallway. This one seems to lead to another room, one that looks like a cross between a library and a medieval armory.

"It's weird that we haven't seen any traps yet," Stiles says into the silence.

Scott snorts, the sound shamelessly rude. "Tamsin doesn't think that we're worth the trouble," he says over his shoulder. "To her, anything supernatural isn't a person to her. I'm willing to bet that she probably thinks that we didn't know how to open doors."

"How do people like Tamsin explain emissaries or you know… _me_?" Stiles can't help asking.

From all the way in front, Isaac laughs. "I don't think they care," he points out. "Tamsin knows about six different ways to kill every single person we know. You're human. She's not going to waste her time or techniques on you, not unless she's planning on torturing you."

Stiles grimaces. "Gee," he mutters, knowing full well that both Scott and Isaac can hear him. "Thanks so much for that."

"You're welcome," Scott says cheerfully.

Suddenly, Isaac stops in his tracks.

"Do you hear that, Scott?" Isaac asks.

Scott shakes his head. "No, what –"

Vaguely, Stiles imagines that he hears the sound of whistling through the air. He blinks twice and then notices something sticking out of the side of Isaac's neck that hadn't been there a moment before.

"Is that a –" Stiles doesn’t get to finish talking because in the next second, Scott tackles him to the ground. He hears the meaty _thud_ of another body hitting the ground and he hopes (desperately, futilely) that it isn't Isaac he's hearing.

Scott growls, the sound loud in Stiles' ear. "Do you remember where the front door is?"

"Y-yeah," Stiles says, nodding.

"I need you to go," Scott says, already turning from Stiles towards where Isaac lays prone on the ground and twitching against a rucked up rug. "Go get the truck running. Isaac and I will be right behind you."

There's something in Scott's voice, something ragged that Stiles can't define that makes him leap to attention. Stiles clambers to his feet, using the side of the wall to brace himself. Without looking back, he takes off in the direction of the car, running as fast as he can. He takes the corners faster than he should, bouncing off of furniture hard enough that he knows that he'll probably have bruises come morning.

Despite the pain that jolts through his limbs, Stiles forces himself the keep running until he can see the door looming in the distance. He skids to a stop in front of the door, reaching for the knob with sweaty fingers that skid off of the metal.

"C'mon, c'mon," Stiles hisses, wrapping his hand in the bottom of his worn grey and green Yoda t-shirt and using that as a way to get a good grip on the door. He twists his wrist and the knob turns underneath his hand, the door practically flying open with the way that Stiles yanks at it.

The truck -- a loan from Braeden and Allison's organization -- is only a few short steps away from the front porch of Tamsin's deathtrap of a house, but that's a few steps too far. Stiles bounds down the stairs, narrowly missing breaking his own neck as he races towards the big black monster of a truck.

"Crap, crap, crap," Stiles mutters, shoving his right hand in one of the deep pockets in his pants and coming up with nothing. Panic cuts through him at the thought of the keys being somewhere in that frighteningly vast horror house. When Stiles goes for the pocket on his left side and comes up with a key ring for Braeden's bodyguard agency and a set of now familiar keys, he nearly cries with relief. Except he doesn't -- he _can't_ \-- because Scott and Isaac are depending on him.

Stiles can have his breakdown later.

When there isn't a rogue hunter and noted serial killer on the loose and Isaac isn't hurt.

By the time gets the truck started, Scott and Isaac have made it out of the house. Scott opens the back door of the truck, and heaves Isaac into the backseat as if he was moving a floppy-haired bag of potatoes instead of a person. Scott quickly climbs into the truck and slams the door shut, all the while staring fixedly at Isaac's too-still face and slack mouth.

In the rearview mirror, when Stiles meets Scott's gaze, he isn't surprised to see that his best friend's eyes are still alpha-red.

"What happened in there?" Stiles asks.

Scott shakes his head. "Tamsin _did_ have a trap ready for us," he mutters, a growl rumbling in his voice. "Isaac got hit with a dart. I don't know what's in it. I kept it though, so we can text Deaton a picture when we get somewhere safe."

Stiles frowns. "Somewhere safe?"

"Derek has a safe house in Portland," Scott says without looking away from Isaac's eyes. Braeden put the address in the GPS and the house keys on the ring. It's only an hour or two away from here."

"She sure thinks of everything," Stiles says as he reverses and then spins the truck around so that they're heading down the access road with their headlights cutting through the darkness. "Do you think she knew that this would happen?"

Scott shrugs. "I don't know. Call her and find out."

Stiles huffs because it's expected of him and then reaches out to swipe the phone icon on the touch screen dead center on the truck's dashboard console right below the CD changer and radio.

"Call Braeden," Stiles says when the car's programming prompts him to choose someone in his contacts list.

It takes about ten seconds for Braeden to pick up.

"What went wrong?" Braeden asks with no small amount of anger in her voice.

It's nice that she knows them by now and that Stiles wouldn't call unless something had gone horribly wrong.

"Tamsin has the house werewolf-proofed," Stiles says. "Isaac got hit with something and we're heading to the Portland safehouse to ride it out. If you have anyone in the area that can get in there and finish checking out Tamsin's murder house, that'd be awesome. Maybe go with someone who's good at shielding -- I'm sure that the house has a few more traps hidden around the place."

For someone so very _human_ , Braeden sure does an excellent job of sounding like a werewolf. She growls loudly enough to raise goosebumps on the back of Stiles' neck and his arms. The sound of her anger practically _fills_ the confines of the truck. "Isaac's hurt?"

Scott speaks up, leaning forward so that Braeden can hear him. "He's unconscious for now, but I don't like way he looked just after getting shot. If we can't take care of him at the safe house, we're going to need to have someone come out and help us."

Then the sound of flipping pages.

"There's a family of practitioners twenty minutes from the house," Braeden says. "They're in with Deaton and have experience with supernatural biology and how to handle most of Tamsin's nastiest traps. I'll text you their number and you can get in contact with them if you need to."

"Thanks," Scott and Stiles say as one.

"Keep me posted," Braeden says before hanging up.

They're at the main road by now and Stiles glances back and forth before easing on to it and heading north to the safehouse and the all-too necessary promise of _safety_

*

Things don't get better.

Isaac doesn't get better.

In fact, he gets worse.

There's nothing physically wrong with him. No blood. No bruising aside from the red pinprick on his neck. No pain when Scott palpitates the wound with the tips of his fingers. However, Isaac can't possibly be even more uncomfortable and in pain.

Isaac stares up at Scott and Stiles with no recognition at all in his eyes. He bucks against their hold when they try to hold him down, easily throwing off Stiles' hands and making Scott have to hold him even tighter.

"Lemme go," Isaac says, body shuddering as he tries to escape the brace of Scott's hands. HIs eyes are so wide and so filled with fear that Stiles finds himself reaching out to soothe him. But Isaac shakes his head. "I didn't do anything wrong, please don't --"

Isaac's voice subsides into panicked whimpers and he struggles even harder, shaky breaths pushing out from his mouth until they almost sound like sobs.

Stiles glances up at Scott, not missing the stricken look on his best friend's face.

"What is it, Scott?"

Scott shakes his head. "I think... I think he's talking about his father."

"His _father_ "?" Stiles repeats.

"Isaac doesn't like to talk about it, but you know how Jackson killed his dad back when we were in high school?" Scott says under his breath. When Stiles nods, he continues talking. "He treated Isaac so badly. _God_. He used to torture Isaac for the slightest thing and he _enjoyed_ _it_." Scott's mouth twists with a bitter sneer. "I honestly think that the world is a better place without him in it."

Strong words coming from Scott who never says anything mean about someone unless he can't absolutely help it.

Stiles looks down at Isaac again.

"HIs dad did this to him?"

Scott frowns. "Whatever Tamsin had in the dart is doing this to him," he says, "But it wouldn't be possible if Isaac's dad wasn't the worst human being in the world."

Stiles is inclined to agree with Scott on that.

"What can we do?"

"If Deaton confirms what I think this is and we're dealing with the same kind of wolfsbane that we got slipped a few years ago, we're just going to have to wait it out. This is Tamsin we're dealing with," Scott says. "She likes handling all of her kills herself. This is supposed to subdue people, not _kill_ them."

With horror slowly dawning, Stiles says, "So she traps people in their nightmares so that she has time to kill them the way that she likes? What is _wrong_ with that woman?"

Scott's answering glower is dark. "So many things."

*

Scott and Stiles take turns sitting with Isaac in front of the safehouse's fireplace

Scott takes the first watch while Stiles showers and gets dressed. He takes the second while Stiles puts together a relatively decent meal from the canned food that fills the safehouse's pantry.

By the time that Stiles ventures out of the kitchen with two plates of food for them and a bowl of soup for Isaac, at least two hours have passed. Hours with no change except in the timbre of Isaac's whimpers and the words that he mutters against the palms of his hands.

"Go clean up and eat something," Stiles says, resting the tray down on an oversized armchair that looks as if Derek stole it from the house of a kindly old grandmother. "I'll sit with Isaac for a while."

Scott frowns. "Are you sure?"

"Yeah," Stiles says. "It's fine. I'm just going to sit here and eat. How much trouble can he be?" Stiles glances at where Isaac lays, body curled into a comma shape a few feet away from the fireplace's grate. He's wrapped in blankets and there's a pillow underneath his head.

If not for the fearful way that he twitches against the blankets, muttering in the hazy half-unconscious state that he's been in since being shot with that dart, Isaac would look as if he's sleeping. Caught in the middle of a nightmare. He doesn't move when Scott scrambles to his feet and dusts off the knees of his cargo pants.

When Stiles drops down beside him a few minutes later though, Isaac's nostrils flare and his eyes flutter open. His gaze skitters off of Stiles's face, seeing him but not seeing him.

"I didn't do it," Isaac murmurs, the sound of his words thick in the air. He shifts, struggling underneath the weight of the blankets as if he's not strong enough to push them off in his feverish state. Isaac turns his face to the side, away from Stiles. "I was good – I _was_ —

When Isaac bolts up, it startles Stiles so badly that he almost drops his plate. Isaac doesn't notice him. His eyes are wide and as he stares around at the dimly lit room and the furniture at eye level. Isaac's chest heaves as if he's just finished running a marathon.

"It's okay," Stiles says, daring to reach out and try and comfort Isaac through touch.

It doesn’t go well.

Isaac's growl, frightened as it may be, comes with the painful _pinch_ of his fingers digging into Stiles' wrist. He jerks free of Stiles' hand and pushes back, inching across the carpet until he's out of arms' reach.

"Don't _touch_ me," Isaac snarls, his eyes glowing gold.

Stiles flinches backward, both hands held upraised with his palms turned outward.

"I'm not," Stiles says hastily. "I mean, I won't. I was just trying to help. You were hurt by something in Tamsin's house and we brought you somewhere safe."

Isaac shakes his head. "N-not safe."

Stiles' pulse leaps. "You're in one of Derek's safehouses in Portland," he says in as calm a tone as he can. "We're miles away from Tamsin's house and Scott's right upstairs. You're safe. No one's going to hurt you."

Against every lick of sense in his head, Stiles reaches out to touch Isaac's arm. "I know it's hard and that you're probably hearing and seeing a whole bunch of weird crap that's freaking you out, but trust me, you're safe."

"Don't lie to me," Isaac hisses through his clenched teeth.

Stiles shakes his head. "I'm not. I'm really not. Just –" He pauses, frowning. "Focus on your senses. I'm _not_ lying to you and I know you can hear it in my voice." Stiles tries not to sigh with relief as Isaac visibly relaxes after inhaling deeply and his shoulders slump.

"My throat hurts," Isaac says, his voice almost sullen as he glances at Stiles out of the corner of his eyes with a faint frown on his face.

Stiles jabs his thumb back at the bowl of soup.

"That's what the soup is for," he says. "You can have something a little more solid when I don't have to worry about you hacking it all up." Stiles bites back a grin. "I hear that Scott makes a mean grilled cheese sandwich."


End file.
